Summer reissue: Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden as On the Rag looks at how the world around us has been built by men, for men. First published December 7, 2020. Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by its members – click here to learn … Read more
In the latest episode of On the Rag, we look at the intersection of gender and design, including this list of women who invented incredible things and then were promptly forgotten about. Women everywhere know the acute frustration that comes when a man steals your suggestion in a meeting and then presents it to a … Read more
Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden as On the Rag looks at how the world around us has been built by men, for men. It can be hard to feel welcome in a world where the phones are slightly too big, your pockets are welded shut and the floors below you are so … Read more
Helping to get more rangatahi Māori interested in animation and design industries, the first class from the Māoriland MATCH programme are set to graduate today. The Māoriland film festival is run every year out of Ōtaki, a small town on the Kāpiti Coast. The five-day event hosts a number of Indigenous storytellers every year, with … Read more
With 27 speakers over a 10 hour event, Semi Permanent Aotearoa showed just how much New Zealand’s creative industry has to offer our economic and social rebuild. It’s a rare thing having 1,000 people in the same room at the same time in 2020. It’s even rarer to have 27 of a country’s most prestigious … Read more
In contrast with last year’s often terrifying local election offerings, 2020’s election signage is big on bold colours and simple messaging. Spinoff creative director Toby Morris delivers his analysis of the best and worst designs. All along suburban fences and major intersections around New Zealand a virus is spreading. Desperate faces splayed out across corflute … Read more
EVolocity is using innovation, creativity and the incoming electric vehicle revolution to encourage kids into STEM education. Madeleine Chapman talks to its founders about the how and why of their mission. If the kids make an electric vehicle that can travel faster than 50km per hour, there may have to be an intervention. That’s too … Read more
Business is Boring is a weekly podcast series presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation. Host Simon Pound speaks with innovators and commentators focused on the future of New Zealand. This week he talks to Greig Brebner from Blunt Umbrellas. This week on the podcast is a business that began with the realisation … Read more
For weeks, Carpet Mill has been running a very strange full page in a national newspaper. Duncan Greive investigates. At first glance, you barely notice it. A large, mostly empty page in a newspaper. A scattering of text, some logos, enough so you don’t immediately clock anything amiss. Only, there’s something off about it. There … Read more
This year’s crop of local election signs range from the inspired to the utterly terrifying. Professional illustrator Toby Morris delivers his analysis of the best and worst designs. The Spinoff local election coverage is entirely funded by The Spinoff Members. For more about becoming a member and supporting The Spinoff’s journalism click here. Faces, faces … Read more
Bruce Mau believes that far from being a hopeless case, the future of the planet is in safe hands. Mau, who is speaking at the Future of the Future presented with Spark Lab on August 15, told Charles Anderson how his philosophy of looking at the world as a design problem gives him optimism for … Read more
In the future personal technology will be so seamlessly built into our lives it will be almost invisible. Claire McCall spoke to Ivy Ross, the woman in charge of designing Google’s hardware, ahead of her appearance at the Future of the Future conference next month. Ivy Ross doesn’t see the future. She feels it. It’s … Read more
Next month some of the most high-powered people from the most important companies in the world are coming to Auckland to speak to local business leaders. Charles Anderson spoke to the organisers of the Future of the Future conference about why and how they pulled it off. On August 15 the future is coming to … Read more
School projects weren’t complete without a meticulously selected WordArt title. Madeleine Chapman looks back at the fonts that shaped many children’s lives. Once upon a time the most important decision in life was choosing a font. Every school project needed the perfect font. Not for the body of text; Arial shmarial, who cares. No, every … Read more
The Single Object is a series exploring our material culture, examining the meaning and influence of the objects that surround us in everyday life. In the sixth part of the series Lucy Treep looks at the history and future of a famous chaise longue at the Architecture and Planning Library at the University of Auckland. Walking … Read more
In their pursuit of an abstracted planning perfection, the designers have seemingly been prepared to sacrifice some people’s experience for the sake of a cleaner looking system, argues miffed North Shore bus user and design lecturer Peter Gilderdale When a huge new public transport initiative rolls out, as it did recently on the North Shore, … Read more
Good morning, and welcome the The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Low growth in the Māori roll, property managers slammed for their memes, and a big cash injection for the billion trees programme. The Māori electoral roll has grown, but not by all that many voters. The option to change between the Māori and the general roll opens … Read more
The conveners and judges of this year’s Best Design Awards nominations are overwhelmingly male. And in the past 20 years, its top award has only been awarded to three women. Designer Catherine Griffiths responds with – what else? – design. Each year the Designers Institute of New Zealand awards two Black Pins, its supreme award. For … Read more
Three extraordinary women have taken their design and architecture skills and created a training programme for some of the country’s most vulnerable rangatahi. Head north on state highway one, stopping for a sandwich among the bright and busy architecture of Kawakawa. Past Moerewa’s giant AFFCO meatworks, glowering on the edge of town like a taniwha … Read more
Every week on The Primer we ask a local business or product to introduce themselves in eight simple takes. This week we talk to Jimmy Hayes, co-founder of premium bags company Minaal, which has raised more than $700,000 USD in crowdfunding. ONE: How did Minaal start and what was the inspiration behind it? My co-founder Doug Barber and … Read more
According to a new report, the design sector contributed over $10 billion to the New Zealand economy in 2016. Henry Oliver asks Thomas Mical, the head of AUT’s School of Art and Design, what that means for New Zealand design. Designers know that their work creates value, but a recent report from DesignCo – commissioned … Read more